Human Capital

Skills, knowledge, ability to labour and good health which enable a person or group of persons venture into different livelihood strategies to fulfil livelihood aspirations is what DFID (1999, p.7) termed as human capital. The above elements (skills, knowledge, ability to labour and good health) which are composite of human capital was first identified by Scoones (1998) in furtherance of Chambers and Conway (1997) conceptualization of sustainable livelihood without any clear elaborations on them. According to DFID (ibid), within the household level, the amount and quality of labour available has to do with human capital where in many cases there is a variations due to household size, skills levels, leadership potentials, health status among others.

Human capital as an intrinsic value in humans is very important within sustainable livelihood concept as it is indispensable tool in order to explore any of the four types of livelihood assets (DFID, 1999, p.7). And though human capital is intrinsic value, there is a great opportunity to directly or indirectly support its accumulation provided those concerning are willing to invest or avail themselves for say training programmes such as farmers learning new farming techniques harvesting (ibid). Examples of both direct and indirect support to asset accumulation are: “health, education, training personnel, development of relevant knowledge and skills, and changes in local institutions in areas like culture, norms that inhibit for example women access to education” (ibid).

Providing the two types of support is imperative and in this case they are combined in an integrated approach way to help the so-called disadvantage groups in the society through a holistic livelihood analysis (ibid). Knowledge gain as result of human capital

accumulation must be useful to reap current and possible future livelihood strategies whiles there should be an opportunity for people to have access to enrich or broaden the knowledge accumulated through say education training (ibid).

To effectively analyse human capital in relation to sustainable livelihood concept require thorough and rigorous indicators in the areas of education and health of people within a demographic settings. In human health for example, DFID (1999, p.8) emphasize that though there are a good number of well-developed indicators such as life expectancy, there may be some complications when it comes to its assessment at the local level. In this case it will be more appropriate to look at the variations on say; live expectancy among different social groups, nutritional situation of indigenous groups children and most importantly the availability or accessibility of quality health care (ibid).

Though assessing education indicators may be less cumbersome, it should not be related only to formal education but also informal education as well (ibid). The argument to this holistic view of education is that, formal education is not the only source of knowledge accumulation of a person or persons (ibid). By also paying attention to local knowledge when analysing human capital in terms of education will lead to an in-depth understanding of the dynamics of the local people which will in turn lead to a purposeful policy implementation.

Neely et al. (2004, p.17) reports of increase in establishment of small scale businesses in the Community Development Organizations (CDOs) project district in Yemen under the funding and supervision of Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) owning to training of the people and the establishment of revolving fund to support them in engagement of economic activities.

Under the Wupperthal and Heiveld rooibos tea initiative/project, tea farmers have gain immeasurable new knowledge which is helping them to diversify their income generating activities (Bek et al., 2006, p.10). Farmers in Wupperthal community are now adding value to their rooibos to by flavouring the tea with lemon for sale to tea consumers whiles the bye-products from rooibos tea is now being used for soap (ibid).

UTZ (January 2014, p.20) impact report shows for example that, 15% of tea farmers in Kenya between 2010 and 2012 improved their knowledge on farming methods through training under UTZ´s good agricultural practices (GAP) programme. Also, UTZ find out

that, 60% of cocoa producers in Ghana and Ivory Coast who are trained under UTZ certification followed what they taught through training activities which by no means contributes to positive attainment of the dimension of human capital (ibid).

The impact of UTZ training programme according to the report (UTZ, January 2014, p.20) is far beyond their trained farmers and using Ghana as a case, the report reveals that cocoa farmers in Ghana passed on what they have learned to their untrained labourers who help them in their farms but it was opposite in the case of Malawi. In the case of Malawi as the report indicates, lead farmers who were trained to pass on the knowledge could not replicate what they have learned to other farmers.

Also in Vietnam UTZ reports of coffee farmers haven acquired substantial knowledge in monitoring and management practices, and application of agrochemicals like fertilizers and pesticides. Vietnamese coffee farmers according to the UTZ impact report are able to maintain their high yields with less inputs like say nitrogen fertilizer (UTZ, January 2014, p.22).

This finding under UTZ (UTZ, January 2014, p.22) is re-echoed by Valerie et al. (2013) in their survey to assess the poverty impact of sustainability standards under Fairtrade in Ghana with point of reference being Kuapa Kokoo project. Since Kuapa Kokoo trainings organized for cocoa farmer includes safe use of pesticides and proper disposal of used chemical containers, it has led to improvement of farmers health (Valerie et al., 2013, p.47).

CONACADO under the Barry Callebaut (undated, p.24) “Organic cocoa farming”

programme in the Dominican Republic also report of how cocoa farmers and technicians have acquire knowledge on how to handle the cocoa beans produced as a food product.

That the hygienic way of handling cocoa and all relevant tools for cocoa farming, does not only save consumers of cocoa products but the cocoa farmers health hazards thereby promoting good health.

On child labour, UTZ according to the findings of their study in Ghana shows a 100%

seizure of cocoa farmers under its certification program using their children to work on their cocoa farms which has led to increase in children of school going age attending school. And not only that, UTZ farmers have increased the amount of money they spend

on their children’s education when compare with noncertified farmers in Indonesia (UTZ, January, 2014, p.29-30).

On education, Bharat Petroleum sustainability development report (2013-2014, p.77) through collaboration with Pratham an NGO whose main activities are to enhance learning capabilities of pupils and students, there has been improvement in reading and mathematics levels of pupils and students in Nandurbar, Sagar, Sundergahh and Mayurbhanj in India with estimated beneficiaries to be around 48253.

Aside this, Bharat Petroleum (2013-2014, p.78) in an attempt to help demystify science has provided what it calls a ‘lab-in-a-box’ for schools that lacks science laboratory infrastructure. This ‘lab-in-a-box’ according to the Bharat Petroleum report (2013-2014, p.78) over 20000 students in Uran India have benefited from this initiative whiles a total of 100 and 180 young leader instructors and teachers respectively have been trained to offer scientific knowledge in the area of physics, chemistry and biology to students.